Customer Reviews

Costa Rica: The Last Country The Gods Made

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I bought this book last year after I came back from a trip to Costa Rica. I wish I had known about it beforehand! The writers are very passionate about everything Costa Rican from coffee to indigenous peoples, from ants to women's issues, from bananas to religion! My favorite chapter was "House Made of Rain", an exploration of the rain forest from the point of view of a bird--you'll never forget it! By the way, the book is a beautiful hardcover, not paperback.

When you see the cover, you know you're in for a MOST unusual book about a country about which 100 guide books have already been written. One sees an angel statue in a graveyard at dawn, or is it twilight? Is this Costa Rica or "have goth, will travel"? Well, maybe a little of both. The eccentricities of the two writers are on the front burner here with subjects like bats, nitrogen-fixing organisms, Arab-oil embargoes, human diseases, hydroelectricity, the Pan-American highway, trash-burning and communism. But maybe that's what makes these series of essays a good read, especially while one is traveling, because the 1-10 page segments stand on their own.

And the photos are equally "unique," shall we say-not what one would normally expect from a travel book. Once you get past the beautiful inappropriateness of the cover picture, the reader is further challenged by artsy, gorgeous photos that seem to stand alone from the text. Fruit still-lifes, rodeo-cowboys, father and son mechanics on a lunch break, cattle herders, city street musicians, a sunlit pathway through a rainforest; all these random images "float" through the text without a care for relevance!

However, having said that, somehow it works. The book as a whole, pictures plus words, truly gives one a "feeling" for Costa Rican life as it is really lived. That's the best way I can describe this strange but exciting book. It makes you feel because it makes you understand. I can't recommend it highly enough.

This book evokes the country of Costa Rica and it's influence on its peoples by describing the harsh, desolate, yet sublime landscape that embodies the contradictions of Costa Rican life within it's borders and in it's geo-political stature in Central America.

As dry-wiited as it is information soaked, this book gives the traveler a place to begin in the land that never seems to be what the traveler expects. "The Last Country the Gods Made" is a contemplative book, a book of essays that creates a spiritual geography, explains the eccentricity of archeology and throws light on the urgency of visionary politics.

This masterful synthesis is a refreshingly unconventional analysis informed by anthopology, migratory science, architecture, environmentalism, epistemology and political minutiae. There is wonderful mini-essay that the authors' call a "sidebar" entitled, "Why No Empire." In it, Colesberry and McLean address the mystery of why the native people of Costa Rica, though amazingly organized, greatly populated and artistically skilled, never formed any urban centers like the Aztec and Mayan empires. Suffice to say, that they pose an utterly unique solution involving Egypt, mideval French wheat farmers, and Vasquez de Coronado's observations of buzzards!

They end this delightful foray with, "...perhaps the local Amerindians had no use for urban zones or concentrations of power that would have placed them in the ranks of advanced societies. If urbanity is the litmus test for civilizations, consider this: in the Diquis area, the leaders lived with not the warriors as one might imagine, but with the artists. How urbane can you get?"

I'd like to say one more thing. The Search Inside the Book pages that Amazon shows you in no way represent the book's text! The pages you can read are just the introduction written by the publisher! It's ridiculous that Amazon doesn't present the meat of this lovely text, since the writing is particularly accomplished.

I was eating at Croce's Restaurant in Old-Towne San Diego, California, when I saw a book displayed called Costa Rica: The Last Country The Gods Made.

Apparently, singer Jim Croce's widow, Ingrid, had spent a couple of years there working and recuperating after her husband's death, and the authors came into her restaurant one day and they ended up trading books with her (she wrote a cookbook, Thyme in a Bottle, in which she details her stay in Costa Rica).

Well, I looked through The Last Country The Gods Made and ended up buying it on Amazon and the writing's particularly engaging for a nonfiction book- parts of it almost read like a novel. The photographs really grab ahold of you too. It's one of the best travel books I've ever read.

I agree with the first reviewer, my favorite essay was also "House Made of Rain." I've just never read anything like it-a vertical description of the rainforest from the point of view of a bird!

The rest of the book is packed with everything that's right about travel writing-insight, humor and surprise. It's also a superior book that will interest and encourage ecotourists, conservationists and amateur naturalists wishing to learn more about the green soul of this irresistible country.

By the way, I bought one autographed by the authors and they wrote a really cool thing: "The heart is a country and the mind a passport. Bon Voyage!"

Being from Argentina, I often think American writers don't get it right when writing about South or Central America. But this book is really respectful while not shying away from Costa Rica's problems. Plus, it captures the Costa Rica I experienced when I vacationed there 3 years ago.

I liked the pictures, too, especially the one taken through a window of an abandoned house, looking up the side of Volcan Irzazu. I gave it 4/5 stars because I wish the photo captions had been on the pages of the photos, but instead they were on a separate page in the back, so I had to keep flipping back and forth. But I guess that's a small thing.

This is a fantastic book. In a very enjoyable way it covers just enough of each of the dimensions that make a country. From the geological beginnings under water to the mountains and high fertile valleys, ancient people to modern day inhabitants, ants to orchids, and beautifully illustrated with excellent photos. We bought a copy before we went, left it with our friends at Diquis Del Sur (diquiscostarica.com), and bought another copy when we got home. Enjoy the book and this beautiful country.

For a travel guide we were torn between the excitement presented in the National Geographic Traveler - Costa Rica book and the superior information for getting around in the Frommer's book. For retirement and living there we preferred "The New Golden Door to Retirement and Living in Costa Rica". The best map is International Travel Maps - Costa Rica, GPS generally works, and most cell phones don't.

The book is actually called, "Costa Rica: The Last Country The Gods Made." The writing is elegant and the pictures are haunting. It showed me a Costa Rica I never knew existed: the lunar landscapes of its still-active volcanoes where wild horses roam, the perfume of its coffee, it's living butterfly museum, and the unusual resolve of its women.

Other cool things I discovered while thumbing thru it were facts about bats, coatis, frogs and Italian towns, Oliver North and pirates!

Whether the small Central American country has always been your secret destination or even if you have never given Costa Rica a single thought, Brass McLean's and Adrian Colesberry have produced one of those rare travelougues that can pique the interest and stir the passion of anyone who thumbs through it. Sporting stark and evocative photography by Kimberly Parsons, the book effortlessly details the distinct history and culture of a country you'll want to experience for yourself after reading this wonderful coffee-table book.

A very pretty book! The cover captures an angel statue
at dawn. Surrounding that picture, the publishers have
integrated into the cover, pictures of fossils found
in Costa Rica, forming a marvelous pattern.

My favorite design element, besides the cover, is the
essays presented in pastel-yellow boxes at the end of
the chapters on funky subjects like the jungle train
or the mysterious and ancient Diquis Balls, which are
perfectly round, carved stones found all over Costa
Rica.

And the photography is anything but characteristic of
Caribbean travel brochures. In contrast, they are wild
and gorgeous and yes, even kooky at times! I display
it on my coffee table and visitors comment on it all
the time. I think it was worth the price and I'm glad
I bought it.